Chapter 13
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
KATELL
Katell didn’t waste time lingering in the Twelfth’s camp.
With Arnza and Pinaria at her back, she made her way through rows of mud-caked tents and bleary-eyed soldiers towards the command pavilion.
She’d slipped a Tear in her mouth before leaving—its rush of magic steadied her hands and sharpened her focus.
Today, she would work on the problem of breaking into Tiryns.
The sooner, the better.
The red standard of the legate snapped above the pavilion, a blood-soaked warning caught in the wind. Katell squared her shoulders and kept walking.
Inside, the air was thick with oil, sweat, and damp leather. Maps littered a long table, held down with knives and half-drunk cups. Legate Tarchun stood hunched over it, barking an order to a junior officer before glancing up.
He looked like a stockier, cruder version of his brother Tyrrhenus—same squared jaw, same perpetual sneer—but it was the eye that turned her stomach. His left eye, the one that wasn’t his, gleamed like a cold shard of moonlight.
The eye of an . A trophy.
She despised it.
Tarchun barely glanced at her as his praefect, Ennius, announced her arrival. “I told the Emperor I’ve no use for Black Helmets,” he muttered, as if she weren’t standing right there.
Anger coiled hot beneath Katell’s skin, but she didn’t let it show. Pinaria stood silent and watchful, while on the other side Arnza shifted slightly, a faint ripple of tension betraying his restraint.
Katell stepped forward and offered Dorias’ sealed scroll with a steady hand.
“We’re here on a mission to infiltrate the city,” she said in a clipped tone.
Tarchun raised a sceptical brow, then snatched the scroll without ceremony. His mismatched eyes flicked over the contents—his eye glinting with faint, unnatural light. After a beat, he let out a derisive snort.
“As if we haven’t been trying for years.” He scoffed. “Well. Best of luck. The city is impregnable.”
The contempt in his voice was clear, and the smirk tugging at his lips made her want to break his nose. He didn’t believe in their mission, but Dorias did. And for his sake, and her own, she had to succeed.
Her gaze drifted to the maps spread across the table—inked lines marking supply routes, siege positions, the jagged edge of Tiryns’ outer wall. No clear weaknesses. No entry point. Just the city, closed and defiant.
“You mean because of the barrier surrounding the city?” she asked, forcing her voice to remain calm. If she was going to break through it, she needed to understand exactly what stood in her way.
Tarchun gave a stiff nod. “So long as Queen Charis sits on her throne, the Grey-Eyed Maiden guards her city. Or so the priests claim.” He waved a hand dismissively. “No one’s breached it.”
The Grey-Eyed Maiden—one of the Achaean Twelve. They were supposed to have disappeared, or at least been weakened, since the Rasennans took over Achaea. Yet the Maiden still protected Tiryns.
But how would her magic fare against Laran’s?
“What kind of barrier is it?” she asked.
“One that burns,” Tarchun replied without pause. “We sent several soldiers to test it, and each returned with severe injuries.”
From his tone, Katell gathered those soldiers hadn’t gone willingly. A knot of revulsion tightened in her throat. The legate seemed to treat lives like siege stones—tossed forward until they shattered.
And this was the man she was expected to defer to.
Her jaw ached from the effort of biting back her contempt. But she drew a breath and forced a smile. “Well, we’d like to try our luck and see if we can find a way. We wouldn’t want to disappoint the Emperor.”
The words turned to ash on her tongue. It was Dorias she refused to fail. But if the legate thought she was doing it to please the Emperor, it couldn’t hurt. Her loyalty had been questioned enough already.
Tarchun paused, his eyes raking over her in a way she hadn’t endured in some time.
Not since the rumours of her and Dorias had spread among the Sixth.
“You’re that Black Helmet everyone’s been talking about,” he said at last, stepping closer.
Wine soured his breath, and the thick perfume on his skin couldn’t mask the rot beneath.
“Laran’s Chosen, is it? I was expecting a brutish girl, but you’re far more beautiful than I’d been led to believe. ”
Katell fought the urge to recoil. Her fingers itched at her sides, every instinct demanding she strike or draw steel. But then she caught Pinaria’s eyes quietly pleading not to make a scene. Not here.
She clenched her fists and drew a long breath.
Tarchun circled her, like a man sizing up a prize horse.
“Perhaps,” he drawled, his voice thick with condescension, “after your little mission fails, you’ll join me for dinner.”
He stopped just beside her and leaned closer. His smile was the kind men wore when they thought they held all the power.
“In my private tent,” he added, the words heavy with insinuation.
Katell’s stomach twisted. Rage prickled at the back of her throat.
Behind her, Arnza gave an awkward cough—an attempt to break the tension, or maybe to keep from punching the legate himself.
Katell answered with a sharp smile. “Perhaps.”
Tarchun seemed satisfied, his smug grin deepening. She nearly rolled her eyes.
“So,” she continued, her tone brisk, “do we have your permission to proceed?”
“Of course, of course,” he said with a lazy wave of his hand, already turning away. “Ennius will assist you.” He nodded towards the tent flaps. “You’re free to go.”
Then, over his shoulder with the same oily smirk: “And I’ll be looking forward to our dinner tonight, Praefect Viridia.”
Katell gave a curt nod, spun on her heel, and strode out of the pavilion, her scowl hidden until the cold morning air hit her face. She would rather burn herself on the barrier than sit across a table from that man.
They rode through the barricaded gate, past two deep trenches lined with sharpened stakes—an echo of the Rasennan siege at the Green Mountains’ hillfort the previous summer. Arnza eyed them in silence, jaw tight, while Pinaria’s expression remained unreadable.
Beyond, Tiryns rose into view.
The city was built on a rocky rise, a fortress carved from stone and defiance.
Its outer walls were monstrous, massive limestone boulders stacked without mortar, fitted with uncanny precision, as if placed by giants rather than men.
Soldiers patrolled the flat ramparts, their silhouettes stark against the sky.
From that height, they could track every movement across the plain for miles.
Katell drew her horse to a halt, staring up at the towering wall.
She had never seen anything like it. Even if they somehow crossed the Maiden’s barrier, how were they supposed to get through that?
As if reading her thoughts, Ennius rode up beside them.
“We have men on the inside,” he said, glancing from the wall to their faces.
“If you break through the barrier, they’ll open the gate—but you’ll have to move fast.” His voice dropped.
“The queen and her court are busy today. Some grand sacrificial ceremony on the far side of the city. Whatever they’re doing, they’ll be distracted.
That makes today your best shot. If you can make it. ”
Katell’s grip tightened on the reins. “We’ll make it.”
Pinaria’s brow lifted in warning. “Praefect Viridia,” she said carefully, forced into formality before Ennius, “we should be cautious. If no one’s crossed the Grey-Eyed Maiden’s barrier in years, there’s a reason.”
Arnza nodded in agreement, lips pressed into a grim line.
Katell smirked, casting one last glance at the towering walls. “Let’s see if the barrier holds up against my magic.”
She spurred her horse forward. Hooves pounded across the grassland, the rush of wind doing little to ease the tension coiling in her chest. The closer she rode, the heavier the air became—dense with pressure, thick with ancient power.
By the time she reached the city’s edge, the magic was suffocating. Her senses dulled, the world narrowing to a dense, humming wall of energy.
Her horse stopped short, then reared in panic, hooves slicing the air. Katell barely kept her seat.
“Animals sense the barrier,” Ennius called, already dismounting. “They won’t go near it.”
Katell slid from the saddle, heart pounding as she approached on foot. At first glance, nothing separated her from the city walls a few paces ahead. But upon closer inspection, the air seemed opaque, as if painted with diluted milk, and shimmered like the inside of a pearl.
Cold sweat beaded at the nape of her neck.
The Grey-Eyed Maiden’s magic.
“Laran’s shield, that’s easy to miss,” Arnza muttered, crouching beside it. His fingers hovered near the surface but didn’t touch.
Pinaria narrowed her eyes, flicking between the barrier and the massive gate beyond. “Was it always here? That seems… impractical for the Tirynthians.”
Ennius shook his head. “No. The barrier rises only in times of danger. It lets those with peaceful intent come and go, but it won’t open for us. Even our spies are trapped inside.”
Arnza’s gaze swept the barren slope. “How do they eat? The city’s on a hill—no fields.”
“There are fertile plains on the far side,” Ennius said. “And the Tirynthians prepared well before the siege. Their gods also gifted them trees that bear fruit in all seasons and crops that never wither.”
Katell’s lip curled. “In that case, the siege—”
“—is useless,” Ennius finished. His mouth flattened, and he swiped a hand down his face as if to wipe away weeks of frustration.
“I know it. The men know it. But command demands a victory.” He turned towards the looming walls, the morning light flaring off his helmet.
His eyes narrowed. “Tiryns is the last Achaean city resisting Rasennan rule. And it’s sheltering Megarian rebels. ”
Katell’s breath snagged in her throat.
“Megarian rebels?” she echoed, pulse quickening.